Converting "Real World" Animals and Vermin

[demiurge1138]

Wait... is this thing already done?

 

[Shade]

It just might be, unless you'd like to change some stuff.

 

[Cleon]

It just might be, unless you'd like to change some stuff.

Looks almost finished, although I can still dredge up a couple of niggles...

The combat section has "It attacks with a leaping charge one prey is within range." I'm guessing that should be "once".

Don't much care for the very last sentence, I'd rather have something like "*A jumping spider's racial bonus on Hide checks improves to +8 when it is immobile or in forest environments, if it is immobile and in a forest the bonus increases to +12."

 

[Shade]

I don't care for that wording, either.

Updated, using the forest landwyrm's wording.

 

[Shade]

Wolf Spider
FREQUENCY: Common
NO. APPEARING: 1-12
ARMOR CLASS: 6
MOVE: 18”
HIT DICE: 2+2
% IN LAIR: 50%
TREASURE TYPE: J-N, Q
NO. OF ATTACKS: 1
DMG/ATTACK: 1-6
SPECIAL ATT.: See text
SPECIAL DEF.: See text
MAGIC RES.: Standard
INTELLIGENCE: Animal
ALIGNMENT: Neutral
SIZE: M
PSIONIC ABILITY: Nil

The wolf spider, like the trap-door spider, lives in a silk-lined burrow, but without the door. She tracks prey by sight and by special scent-detecting organs located in the pedipalps. When she sees prey, she sprints after it, captures it, and paralyzes it before returning to her den.

She is very protective of her young, carrying the cocoon under her belly wherever she goes and fighting fiercely for her young. When hatched, wolf spiderlings number from 100-200, and will ride on the mother’s back until they are full grown. If the mother encounters another female wolf spider, she will stop and let her young get off, and then she will fight the other spider to the death. The survivor will adopt the spiderlings of the dead mother.

Originally appeared in Dragon Magazine #67 (1982).


Should the young be treated as a spider swarm if attacked?

 

[freyar]

Regular hunting spider plus scent. Maybe switch poison to Dex due to paralysis? Not sure on that point. Would it be reasonable for the young to act as a spider swarm in combat?

 

[Cleon]

I don't care for that wording, either.

Updated, using the forest landwyrm's wording.

"*They have a +4 racial bonus on Hide checks when in forest environments. This bonus on Hide checks increases to +8 when the spider is immobile."

But they already have a +4 racial bonus on Hide, so they wouldn't get any benefit from a +4 racial bonus on Hide checks when in forest environments, as racial bonuses don't stack.

How about making their immobility bonus a different type? Something like:

*Their racial bonus on Hide checks increases to +8 when in forest environments. An immobile jumping spider gains a +4 circumstance bonus on Hide checks.

 

[Cleon]

Regular hunting spider plus scent. Maybe switch poison to Dex due to paralysis? Not sure on that point. Would it be reasonable for the young to act as a spider swarm in combat?

I'd just make them a regular Hunting Spider with scent and a ground speed higher than 30 ft. (40 feet? 50 feet?)

Strength damage can immobilize its victims too, but I'd have no objection to switching it to Dex.

If we were being "realistic" I'd say no on the spider swarm of hatchlings, since a wolf-spider's babies would just scatter in real life if their mama can't protect them. Still, this is D&D and I'll confess I've used the "killer baby spider swarm" myself more than once, so it's certainly do-able.

I'll leave it up to you.

 

[freyar]

Well, I agree about the swarm, but I'm just trying to figure out some way to differentiate it from the "regular" monstrous spiders.

 

[demiurge1138]

Yeah, this is just a hunting spider. Let's skip it.